Footwear giant Globe recently opened its first signature store high up amongst the well-worn rafters of the Old Burleigh Theatre Arcade, Gold Coast. But while it’s low-key in location, Globe have massively high hopes for the project they’ve dubbed “The Loft”.
The doof-doof music of Radio Metro seems to bounce off the polished woods floors, while rows of skate decks and neatly folded t-shirts immediately grab the eye upon entering the second-story retail space named “The Loft”. But while the store looks for all intents and purposes like any other surf/skate hole in the wall, it’s once you delve past the initial cursory inspection its true character comes to light. Globe team surfboards from the likes of Noodles, CJ and Damien Hobgood contrast with an array of spayed-up board art, while shelves accommodate action dolls of an unlikely mix of heroes and villains - from religious figure Moses to movie character Scarface.
But if President Bush talking dolls seem kinda out of place in a skate store, then there are the books. A coffee-table sized biography on Ziggy Stardust sits alongside contemporary bestsellers like Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas, Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale and searing political works like “Churchill’s Hour” and “Selecting The Pope”. Yep, it’s a hodge-podge of products that surprise and confuse, but that’s exactly the kind of effect Globe are fishing for. Globe’s Vice President of marketing, Steve Douglas, explains; “There’s no hidden agenda. The store’s not part of a master plan for more signature stores, we just wanted a space to define our product, so didn’t stick to conventional store guidelines. There are no traditional retail fittings, and Russian-issue submarine memorabilia has a place beside high-end skate gear. You never know what you might find - especially since all stock is rotated every three days, everything’s always fresh.”
But why this location for a skate footwear company’s signature store? The Old Theatre Arcade has held a long and illustrious connection with surfing, and The Loft aims to represent its watery ties too. Straight across from the infamous barrels of Burleigh point, the arcade once housed offices for a fledgling Australia’s Surf Life magazine, and has been ground zero for Surfing Australia for many years. But it’s also far cry from retail nirvana, and a more- out-of-the-way hidey-hole location to plonk a store would be hard to imagine. So it’s no surprise Douglas insists the main impetus behind deciding a location for the store was more about Burleigh, which has become a hub for Globe, than slotting into a busier shopping district. “We’ve got a nice connection to Burleigh. Our night surfing and Globe Junior Teams Challenge events are held here, and we set up a marketing office in the area several years ago. I think Burleigh suits our company’s personality more than any other location on the Gold Coast. It’s an important place for surfers, but as you know our roots are in skateboarding, so it’s a big plus that Pizzy Park is nearby. It seemed logical to set up our first signature store here,” says Douglas.
The store is “signature” in more ways than one- it’s also a signature-hunter’s dream. “Every time a board is shaped for a team surfer like CJ, they shape an extra which often ends up in the store. All of our pro model skateboards come through here too. So the only boards we stock have either been ridden by the team or are brand new ones worthy of ‘em.
“Customers can score a high-performance, signed board for the same price as any regular board, and we get our skate team to sign pro models, so it’s a real bonus for customers. You should see kids faces when they go to buy a Rodney Mullens deck and you tell ‘em it’s been signed, and there’s no extra cost. You can’t buy that kind of good will,” says Douglas.
And while there’s currently a Plasma screen and lounges taking up the far corner of the store, it’ll be evolving into an art space, as mentioned in our recent Lifelounge feature on Lee Ralph. “We’ll be handing over room to Lee, NZ’s most iconic skateboarder – he recently made Thrasher magazine’s ‘Most Loved Skater of All-Time’ list. He’s an amazing artist, and is highly regarded in the skate art scene. His circle of friends includes some of the world’s best, heavyweights like Mark Gonzales and artists of that calibre. So the other half of the space will go to whichever of Lee’s buddies that has fresh stuff to showcase. “
From skate to surf, from memorabilia to downright bizarre trinkets, The Loft defies categorising. “The collection of products in store does it’s best to define all the different influences we feel the brand has encompassed,” says Douglas. When suggested that might just mean Globe is a bit schizophrenic, Douglas laughs and agrees. “That’s a good thing!”